A long time ago I wrote some waffly piece for a wool publication, asserting that the future for an expanding wool trade and industry lay increasingly in the Far East.

It was quite a novel idea at the time, and for some years it looked shrewd.

It now seems that, with others, I got it wrong, for the time being anyway. The growth regions of the Far East have not only ceased to grow, they have sharply contracted.

Inaccurate wafflings by market journalists don't matter much. What mattered more was the way Australian wool officialdom, eventually persuaded (not by my article, surely?) that expansion lay in the Far East, went on to dismiss Western European countries as markets of declining importance.

Europe was scarcely worthy of promotional and other support. Offices were closed, officialdom contracted and moved itself to Australia and the Far East. But events have moved on.

Following the disasters experienced in the unhappy Asian region in the past 12 months, where would Australian wool prices be without Europe among the leading remaining buyers? Australian farmers are already often saying enough is enough, and refusing to sell their wool at such uneconomic levels. But where would they be without steady support from Europe?

So when this awful wool market spell does come to an end, perhaps Australian wool officialdom would just bear in mind that what is old and traditional, and finding it difficult to maintain expansion despite leadership in fashion, might be worth looking after, too. Even when Asia does come back into its own, don't forget how important Europe has been, and still is and will be.

It might also be worth remembering that Europeans are normally more reliable when it comes to paying up even when contracted prices do fall.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.